A Fish Tale Told by Candlelight

He’s not even a pescatarian, but local chef Chad White recently professed his love for one of his favorite fish in a public forum. And he did it in a big way – by having the image of a sculpin tattooed onto his calf. For those who’ve never seen a sculpin, it’s one of the uglier denizens of the deep blue. For White, beauty is only skin deep—literally—and, given the manner in which he’d planned to unveil his new ink, it’s safe to assume there was a double meaning for his devotion to this noble yet none-too-pretty creature.

Having recently had the outline of the sculpin inked, he had planned to have it colored in during a special beer-pairing dinner with Ballast Point Brewing Company on September 8 at his restaurant, Sea Rocket Bistro. Specialty brewer, Colby Chandler was scheduled to be on-hand at the dinner to discuss the beers being served. Chandler is well known as the artisan responsible for one of San Diego’s most well-known brews: Sculpin IPA. But, alas, Thursday’s epic power outage thwarted this spectacle.

But the rest of the show did go on, with White and his staff cooking by candlelight to a packed dining room. Given the traffic congestion that choked the county, many of those patrons were walk-ins, but a number of guests with reservations made it in to see what Sea Rocket could do with the help of lit wax spires and loads of dry ice. All that was missing was the color-by-number portion of the evening.